(She gives me the name. My coworker gets a description of her mother as I page. When it’s a lost child, all we say is ‘We have something of yours’ for safety reasons. This is to make sure the child does go with their actual parent.)

Girl: “I think she left.”

Coworker: “No, she didn’t. She’s probably looking for you.”

Girl: “She said she was going to leave me if I didn’t keep up.”

Me: “She didn’t mean it. Don’t worry, she’ll be here.”

(We get the girl to talk about her school and dog to keep her mind off how scared she is. It is the longest we have waited for a parent to come. Her mother finally gets there, and stops as soon as she sees her daughter.)